الفهرس 
1. INTRODUCTIONOnly 14 pages are availabe for public view
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Abstract
Environmental pollution caused by heavy metals (HMs) occurs mostly as a result of industrial and agricultural activities. Variable industrial effluents, re- current applications of sewage sludge, municipal trash, extensive chemical ferti- lization, and air pollution are the main sources of soil HMs. Many of the HMs absorbed by plants in highly contaminated soils are often synergistic, increasing their toxic impacts (Galal, 2016). Unlike organic substances, the increase of HMs in soil and/or water because of their non-biodegradability poses significant threats not only to the ecosystem, soil fertility, and water resources but also to animals and human health, which are the last link in the food chain. Depending on the amount of HMs in the soil structure, the metabolic pathways in plants change, causing growth limitation, and may lead to plant death (OZ et al., 2015; Sahay and Gupta, 2017). HMs are mobile through plasma membranes within the plant and can bind to sulfur and oxygen (O2) and interact directly with proteins and DNA (Choudhury et al., 2013; Chmielowska-Bak et al., 2014).
Often, a number of metals are responsible for soil contamination. Cadmium (Cd) and lead (Pb) are among the most toxic HMs in the soil. Cd and Pb are among the most pollutants in Egyptian soil, resulting from industrial and agri- cultural activities and car exhausts along agricultural highways (Sarhan et al., 2021). They are listed second and seventh, respectively, in the list of the most dangerous poisonous metals (ATSDR, 2012). Maximum permissible levels of soil Cd (1–5 mg kg–1) and Pb (50–150 mg kg–1) have been recorded for the pro- duction of vegetable crops (Fattahi et al., 2021). Because of its tens of thousands of years of persistence in soil, Cd pollution is one of the greatest threats to the agricultural system and animals and human health through the food chain by being absorbed by plant roots (Rizwan et al., 2017; Alharby et al., 2021). Be- cause of the necessary metals and/or cofactors being displaced at the en- zyme-active site, metals alter the status of cellular redox. Th